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Wasurenai to chikatta boku ga ita (2015)
Love defies all odds
In this enigmatic film, a girl encounters an inexplicable phenomenon of being forgotten by everyone she meets! May be it's a viral anomaly or a curse, remains unclarified throughout the movie. Even her father doesn't remember her at home, deepening her isolation. But one guy defies the odds and falls in love with her, only to forget her and again fall in love with her.
It sounds weird in words, but through the lens of Japanese cinema's magical realism, the seemingly implausible premise becomes strangely believable, drawing viewers into a mesmerizing tale of love, loss, and the resilience of the human spirit.
Shizukana ame (2019)
Reverse Groundhog Day
"You & I, we both live in the same world.
But each of our worlds are different."
This would be a reverse groundhog day! A woman suffers from dementia-like symptoms after a car accident. She lives each day as a fresh one, with no memories of past day, but retaining memories till one year ago.
It sounds weird in words. As in an affair one could have loved her for over a year, but to her he will appear only an acquaintance. Whereas an ex-partner from 5 years in the past can just easily appear to have more significance to her over him. But as it is with the magic in Japanese films, everything ends up convincing!
Gypsy (2017)
Therapist Gone Wrong!
A middle aged therapist, who gets too personal with her patients. This tendency of her gradually creates complications in her family life, makes her more and more unstable, sometimes even becomes a threat to her life!
A show with great premise, but somehow fails to deliver. From the 4th episode, the show runs out of stories - nothing just happens after a point! Netflix cancelled the show after 1st season. The only reason why I finished the season is Naomi Watts - she was amazing in the "THERAPIST GONE WRONG" role!
Live from Dhaka (2016)
Nihilistic Tale of Dhaka City
"I'm not a saint, I'm just an ordinary man! I have a limit to patience!"
The best Bangladeshi film I have seen in a while. It is a nihilistic tale of Dhaka city, through the eyes of an educated unemployed 30 year old - who loses everything in stock market crash, fraudulence & political instability in 2010s. Sudden violent outbursts & manipulative acts of all the characters in the film portrays a deep ingrained sickness within the culture of unfreedom, depression, unwellness & exploitation.
A Ghost Story (2017)
Ethereal Symbolism
I think the movie was about a divorce or break-up. If we consider the house as the relation, the ghost can be considered as an unhealthy attachment of the unwilling partner. 'Leaving the house' meant mutual decision of separation. The ghost watches the grieving lover, like stalking exes in social media.
In the end, the ghost finds a note left by Rooney. The note symbolized letting go of unhealthy attachments, which sets 'it' free.
Cobra Kai (2018)
Radicalizing Underdogs
What initially seemed as another show about insecure teenagers, kept me glued to the screen till the season finale!
We always see the bullied, the weak as innocent, victims, some'thing' to be sympathized with. But the underdogs can also be radicalized. The series is about a group of underdogs, turned aggressive through a style of Karate - "Cobra Kai". It is very opposite to "Miyagi-do", another style of karate which emphasizes balance, harmony etc.
The series is sequel to the Karate Kid Movies, following a distraught Lawrence whose life and confidence is ruined after losing the karate competition to LaRusso during high school. While LaRusso becomes a successful car dealership owner, happily married with children, Lawrence is this unemployed (sort of), aggressive middle aged man (who are very well known in the post-recession Trump era in US). LaRusso, though better off than Lawrence, suffers in his own way in his business, in his family life, and being away from his passion.
Lawrence opens up his own dojo, radicalizing bullied teenagers with his Cobra Kai style. Things seem fine at first, as the weak being equipped to defend themselves, but things start going wrong when his followers turn too aggressive by his ideology.
Annihilation (2018)
A Philo-Fiction than a Sci-fi
To me, Annihilation was more of a Philo-Fiction than a Sci-fi. I have to introduce a philosophical view to explain it. German philosopher Martin Heidegger saw all of existence, including- living beings, inanimate objects etc., as negation of 'Nothingness'. If you consider an empty glass- even if there is no water, the glass is still there. Considering pure vacuum, there is still the container. To him, Nothingness is the original state of everything. We are in that sense negation of a certain 'Nothing'. The Nothing I am talking here may or may not be something like Dark Matter or Dark Energy, but I leave the physical interpretation to you.
(Spoilers)
The 'Shimmers' place may have contained a different kind of 'Nothing' than that of our own. Did you notice how the light also had a strange glow? The new 'Nothing' acted like a prism made by a medium placed upon another, which refracted DNAs of different species like refracting light. Evident by the crocodile having teeth of shark, the surreal bear preserving the dying part of its victims' minds, the human shaped plants, finally the overall DNA mixture of the human characters from the time of entrance. When at the end Lena (Natalie Portman) asks if Kane was 'Kane', he replied no. I think, so wasn't Lena.
There were Buddhist themes present in the film also. Like lives transforming from one form to other, shown by the uncanny event of the bear preserving dying mind as mentioned earlier. Only beings willing to embrace 'Nothing' through self-nihilation achieve Nirvana, as did the formed beings mirroring humans entering the light house. May be the final nihilation of the whole Shimmer place represented the new 'Nothing' diffusing with the original.
The movie had a very unique theme, as opposed to the territorial alien invasion Sci-fis. When the investigation team asks Lena if there were any aliens left, she gave confusing answers - because there weren't any alien life forms present in the first place. The new 'Nothing', to me, remained in a diffused form with the original.
The Man from Earth: Holocene (2017)
End of Holocene: End of Immortality
Sequel to the movie about a 14,000 year old man, the movie kept pretty much the amazement it had in the first one. This part is about 4 students of John Young (aka John Oldman) discovering the secret of him.
Although being constantly called the best professor by colleagues and students, Professor Young got a sudden unusual kind of curiosity from a group of his students at the end of their study. Their curiosity peaks to a level of stalking when one of them- Isabel finds a book on John's last encounter about his truth. Soon after, a climate of agitation starts building, even escalating to fatal consequences.
What the story shows is that everyone is so drawn by the truth, but when faced with it they just cannot accept it. People like Philip and the FBI agent project their own fears on him, making him either god or the devil. To avoid all this John has to keep moving every 10 years, but he has to sacrifice his past ties in this process also. The discovery of his students had to make his next transition hasty, hurting his lover and his colleague by his decision to leave without explanation.
By the end of the movie his acquaintance suggests that the age of Holocene has ended, so may be his age of immortality. The 10 year interval transitions would also stop in light of present technological marvels, so he has to return to his past solitary cave life.
Zer (2017)
Journey into Roots: A search for a song
Zer is a young man's journey into his roots, an exploration of a song originated in a village removed from history.
Jan, a young American with Turkish heritage, is greatly moved by a Kurdish folk song sung by his grandmother before death. After returning to Turkey to bury her, he is shunned off by his family whenever he asks about that song. Finally getting the initial clue from his aunt, Jan starts his journey into the origin of the song, the village of his grandmother.
The journey from the city to village regions was like returning to the past. In his journey he sees undue military presence, listens to old tales and songs, participates in a wedding, has a unspoken moment with a lovely young girl - all of which may or may not resemble the old times. Through a sequence of clues he advances towards the song origin, but the song however makes people sensitive whenever brought up. His journey finally brings him up to the village Hozat, only to see a lake only. In the end he dives in it to have a moment of underwater hallucination of the village in the old times, which was submerged under water in 1938 and its people massacred by the Ottoman military.
The narrative is similar to Loving Vincent (2017), as in the story being told through a 3rd person. Also similar was Gloomy Sunday (1999), being about a song. The film has some 1st person camera angles (not 3rd person), which is very rare to see. The cinematography is beautiful in an unnerving way. The ending sequence is a moment to remember in film experiences.
The Shape of Water (2017)
Best of 2017: A Narrative on Love Vs Fear
I always argue against the concept of Hate being opposite to Love. I think opposite to Love is Fear. When you love someone, you open up to the possibility of being hurt to an extent. Fear makes people uptight, closed. I think The Shape of Water is a great narrative to this Love Vs Fear concept.
I love Sally Hawkins. She always play very optimistic, lovable, free spirit type of characters (also watch Happy-Go-Lucky). Here she plays Elisa, who is open to new experiences, pleasure of the senses, loves people, and has a pleasure association with water - which may be synonymous to loving life. Her painter neighbor Giles is also like her, loves art and authenticity, knows to look past fear. The antagonist Richard (Michael Shannon) is the stark opposite of her, afraid of failure, losing, perceives pleasure as something bad, racist, lacks empathy, has a sort of rotten heroic theme, obsesses over objects which will make him seem bigger than other people.
Elisa loves this different, other worldly being. She sees the Amphibian Man as she herself is, a loving creature. Richard sees 'it' as something dangerous, something beneath him. I think there is a hint of xenophobia inherent in the plot. Another noticeable thing is that when Giles is wounded by the creature, he perceives it as an accident and heals up. Richard was unable to move past the violent incident of losing his two fingers, the wound also didn't heal. Richard is the embodiment of all the people who cannot outgrow fear. Placing Giles as the narrator of the story, the ending could move past the narrowness of reality.
Also loved how Dr. Hoffstetler & Zelda tried to outgrow the culture of fear. Dr. Hoffstetler tried to outgrow Cold War, the mindset of hating and fearing the other side. Zelda outgrew slave morality by doing the right thing, even if it meant committing sin or breaking the law.
To me it is the best movie of 2017.